aircon, rain showers and potholes...

Whewie! 10 hours to do the 400km from Bilene to Morrungulo and every minute of the airconditioning was worth the investment. The road was TERRIBLE!! The road from Xai-xai north is really worse than no road at all – a multi coloured patchwork of potholes, some filled, some fixed, some half filled and some partially fixed. It makes driving smoothly impossible. The game is pretty much to see how long you can drive with the potholes between the wheels swerving left and right and off the road and on the road and across to the other side of the road, until you getted tricked into going into a big one and the whole truck shakes, the mirrors fold inwards and everyone gives a little squeal! Slow speed doesn’t help, nor does seeing a Landcruiser 200 flying past at 100km/hour at some point today (I’m sure he was flinching every now and again, and I’m nearly sure that fairness would mean he gets a pothole puncture at some point!).

Well we found our campsite – Morrungulo – as the light was fading fast. Lush and low hanging bushes & trees and they had space for us! We spent three nights here, using the pool, the sea and we even tried their restaurant (once). The pool and the sea were great. We had a bit of rain one evening and only a few leaks in the truck – so all manageable.

We were afraid of setting off again, because we knew that there was only really one more chance of staying by the sea before heading inland towards Malawi, and knowing that there was that patchwork road again (I always thought a truck would float effortlessly over the potholes with its huge tyres and over engineered chassis etc – meanwhile, if you’ve ever driving an unloaded bakkie over a bad road, you’ll be able to imagine an 8 tonne unloaded truck with super hard tyres!! (I’d let the tyres down but have no clue how hard they are! Normal 4x4 tyre pressure gauges only go up to about 3 or 4 bar, and the recommended soft pressure for these tyres is 5.5! So I suspect that at around the 8 bar level!))

After a dry steak and cool fans at lunch time in Vilanculos (Smugglers sports bar) we arrived at Inhassoro early evening. We had time to drive around looking for somewhere nice to camp, but most of the town is very village-y (which means lots of litter lying around the crumbling beach front ruins). After finding a puddle we checked out the guide books which confirmed Laura’s memory from about 9 years ago, and we settled at Hotel Seta campsite.

The sea here is nice and warm but there are thousands of beach weeds in the water – we’ll take a picture tomorrow, but it is really wierd, like millions of leaves in the water – way worse that swimming in sea weed. Kaylin didn’t mind though so we had a good evening swim before heading back to the truck for the night time routine.

Tomorrow we’ll go have that swim in the weeds (for photo sake) and then we’re going to hit the highway (apparently it’s a good road north) and try get to the lake (via Chimoi) as smartly as possible – I think it’s about another 1000km or so.

So we’re nearly ready to get to bed ... one more story, our coffee machine has been double sided tape, presticked and checked regularly. We always knew it would fall off sometime, but we kept on pretending it wouldn’t. Today it happened, while we were dodging potholes, it smashed on the floor (1 x chip in the floor) spread coffee beans and coffee grounds all over the place, and lost a few pieces of itself. After picking it all up and putting it back together we turned it on to see what juice it would give us ...suprise suprise! Jura ENA5 coffee machine is made rugged! Had a perfect cup of coffee – the machine is just a little louder than normal because the side panel has popped half off. Whew! We were nearly going to be home for Christmas!

getting to mozambique...

Well the border was more of an interesting experience than what we've previously had in our African travels in the past.  We did anticipate it to be a bit of a hassle, and prepared the kids well in advance, but we didn't expect it to be a 4 hour procedure!  As you can see from the photo, the queue of cars up the road to the border post took us 3 hours.  Luckily we found our 'guy' to help us through easily when we eventually got there.  It was pretty crazy in there, so once we stuck our heads in and saw the queue that we had to stand in, he took us to another smaller room with VIP above the door...... mmmmm...... we knew this was going to cost us, but went along anyway.  With only one other guy standing in there waiting for his passport to be stamped we realised that this was going to be a whole lot quicker.  While the kids and I waited on the plush leather couches next to the fresh flower display, Alex sorted out our passports with the friendly Mozambiquan official behind the desk.  It took a whole 5 minutes.  Nice!  Only after it was all stamped and done, did we realise as we walked out the door, that we were expected to pay the guard outside a little something for his trouble.  We gave our guy R50 to give to the guard, and felt a bit uneasy and tricked into contributing to a bit of bribery & corruption.  Unfortunately/fortunately that's just the way things work.

Now our real African Adventure begins! We headed towards Maputo with excitement.  We were so proud of the kids for handling the drive so well so far.  They really are great kids, ready for any adventure!  We got stopped at a road block and the traffic cop looked at all 4 of us in the front and said that it's not right for them to be in the front, but we showed him their seatbelts, and with a big smile he waved us on our way again.  Shew!

We hit major traffic passing through Maputo.  We weren't sure what the problem was but had to go with the flow.  We got to see a lot through the outskirts of the town as the major EN1 highway passes through some interesting areas.  We were going very slowly, and after about 2 hours we travelled about 30km.  Then we saw that it was a fender bender that had caused the traffic, and once we passed it we were on our way again.

We decided to head to a campsite called Laguna Camp, near Bilene.  It's 40km off the highway, with the last 7km being lovely sand track, which Alex of course loved!  Unfortunately we realised that one of the major downfalls of this amazing truck is the height.  We had to dodge a lot of low branches, wincing a few times thinking that our sunset picture is going to be scratched to pieces.  We got here, and booked 2 nights so we could recover from the hectic day.

It's been a great day today!  The campsite is on a hill, with a short walk down to a stunning Lagoon.  We spent the morning down on the lagoon beach, then back to the swimming pool in the campsite, followed by a lunchtime DVD & reading rest time, then back to the pool for a long swim..... aaaah very chilled out.  Holiday has begun!

We're heading further north tomorrow, about 400km if we can.  Looking forward to the drive and the adventure that awaits us.

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New Windows 7: Simplify what you do everyday. Find the right PC for you.

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Windows 7: Simplify what you do everyday. Find the right PC for you.

nearly ready to leave...

Today we had some fun in the mud at Nature’s Gate, some last minute shopping in Nelspruit, and then a bit of a drive to Komatiepoort, and finished off with an evening swim.

 

Now we’re ready to leave South Africa and get into Mozambique tomorrow morning!

cape town to nelspruit

Yippee! So we’re on the road. Thanks to my dad we have a relatively dry truck ... he spent Monday evening smearing silicon around the tents to try prevent the leaking, and it seems to have worked! On the drive up to the JHB airport I had rain storms, thunder, lightening and hail on the highway.

 

The nice thing about a truck with a comfortable house on the back is that you can sleep comfortably for free at the truck stops with the rest of the truckers, but can have a comfy bed and a duvet like at home. Only problem is that the truckers wake up at 5h00 every morning to get on with their deliveries!

 

After 2 days of driving flat out (i.e. 95 km/hour) I woke up on Thursday morning relaxed, and i arrived at the airport 5 minutes before the family did! We drove the next 4 hours to try to get to Nelspruit by bed time, and just outside of Nelspruit we hit a traffic situation – we suspect an accident or something, but after 20 minutes of waiting, we U-turned over the centre island and headed back to Nature’s Gate Caravan Park which I had seen, and had a delicious night’s sleep.

 

This morning is warm and drizzly, and we’re having a nice relax in this lush foresty campsite. Today’s plan is to go buy the last few things we thought about from Nelspruit and then head into Mozambique (or find a nice campsite in SA again ... ). It’s great not having a plan!

"Test" Weekend - by Laura Munro

We thought it would be a good idea to have a "test" weekend away, and seeing as though our annual Sunday School Camp fell on the weekend before our departure into Africa, this worked out well. Or so we thought. The weekend didn't start off so well.....

It's my job to do the inside 'check-list' before we drive off. Check that all the doors & drawers are locked, the shower extractor is shut, etc etc. After driving for about half an hour we decided to put the kids in the back so that they could fall asleep in their beds as we were running a bit late and they were exhausted from helping with all the packing. When we opened the back of the truck we were greeted with a floor smeared with yoghurt, feta juice, stawberries, blueberries and the tomato sauce jar (luckily unopened!). It seems that the full check list hadn't been 'checked', and the fridge hadn't been locked! A mistake that will only happen ONCE! We decided to not let the mistake get us down, who needs to cry over spilt yoghurt anyway, we got ourselves some big take-away coffee and headed on to the camp. Next hurdle........ after turning off the N1 towards Franshoek, the road took a sharp right turn, and oops! Alex's full coffee tipped over and spilt down at his feet - "very dissapointing" - his words exactly.

As you can see from the pictures, the weekend went on to be very enjoyable. Lots of fun on the lake. We got to test out our "SUPPING" (Stand Up Paddle Boarding) which we will be doing lots of on Lake Malawi.

Unfortunately the weekend

ended with another big obstacle.......

We headed of towards home on the N1 again. Kaylin needed to stop for a wee break, so we just pulled over on the side of an offramp. But, unfortunately when we wanted to start Max again, he just wouldn't budge! Totally dead! So there we were, all bundled in the back of the truck - kids thinking that this was a great adventure, us thinking...... whats plan B? Are we gonna have to cancel our trip? Who do we call to tow this thing? We got the number for the Mercedes Truck Assist, and they reassured us they'd be there in 45min - Great! Just then, we got a phone call from our good friends Candice & Kevin, who by chance had been having lunch in Paarl, and drove down the highway, and just couldn't miss this huge truck that looked oh so familiar. They pulled over and offered to take the kids & I home while Alex waited for the Assist guys.

The good news is - the problem was just that the starter motor wasn't connected. We presume it got disconnected from when the airconditioning was installed last week. The guy told us that we were lucky to have been able to start it on the weekend, the wires must of just been touching slightly. Simple, but stressful. Things we've learnt.... keep the phone number handy, there's a Mercedes Truck Assist no. in every country in Africa, they'll come fix any problem (hopefully we won't need them tho'), and... teach Kaylin to wee in the toilet on the move!

one week to go...

We hear that Africa is hot & rainy this time of the year ;-) so we have had the leaks sorted out, and today we're installing the aircon in the cab.

Our plan is for me to leave next Tuesday (8 Dec), and pick up the family from JHB airport on Thursday to start our holiday. Our very rough & flexible plan is as follows:

• week 1 - Cape Town to Inhambane (Moz)
• week 2 - Inhambane to Cape Maclear (Malawi)
• week 3 - Malawi
• week 4 - West Tanzania / Rwanda
• week 5 - North Tanzania (Serengeti / Ngorongoro)
• week 6 - north Tanzania to Zambia
• week 7 - Zambia / Malawi again
• week 8 - Botswana / Mozambique again
• week 9 - arrive back to "our house in the ground" (source: Xan)

Now normally when we travel, once we hit the turnaround point we generally have the unusual habit of just getting home, for example:

1. Blantyre to Cape Town in 2 days (after my bike trip)
2. Durban to Cape Town in one go from 12h00 midday (planned to take two days)
3. Lost in the Richtersveld (the whole day to get out of the river canyon) to Cape Town in 1 go
4. Swakopmund to Cape Town

etc etc...

But: our main plan is to be flexible and follow our hearts - if we don't get beyond Inhambane in 8 weeks, that would be a good change of plan to have!

So much to just finalise this week, and make sure that the work team are comfortable with me working "extreme mobile", and finishing off some contract work, and setting up for 2010, and making sure that Max is ready, shopping, carnet de passage ... absolutely can't wait!

leaks & face lift

this week rained a lot, and we're sorting out some leaks, a flat battery, and getting our ride pimped...

we did however successfully renovate our driveway to make Max fit, and a day after that we found a place up the road where we could store Max underground in a secure mobile home/caravan parking bay!!

But we're planning on keeping it at home for true mobile office days and spontaneous weekend camp-outs.

Max is now back in Knysna for a week or so to get some more of the 'snags' done so that we can hopefully be ready to leave on the 10th December as planned.